The primary means we have of encouraging positive change in Cuba today is to help the Cuban people become less dependent on the Castro regime in fundamental ways. U.S. policy must be built around empowering the Cuban people, who ultimately hold the destiny of Cuba in their hands...

Cuban-American connections to family in Cuba are not only a basic right in humanitarian terms, but also our best tool for helping to foster the beginnings of grass-roots democracy on the island. Accordingly, I will grant Cuban Americans unrestricted rights to visit family and send remittances to the island.

In response to Obama's statement, Hillary Clinton continued her recent attacks on his perceived foreign policy naivete, insisting that "until it is clear what type of policies might come with a new [Cuban] government, we cannot talk about changes in the U.S. policies toward Cuba."

Clinton "is going with the status quo," said Sergio Bendixen, a Miami-based pollster who specializes in Hispanic voters. Obama, he said, "is with the position of change."

In the February 11, 2008, issue of Newsweek, Fareed Zakaria argues that the daylight between and Obama and Hillary Clinton is manufactured -- by Clinton, out of caution and calculation. She has been trying to win votes in Florida and New Jersey, rather than arguing for clearly needed policy change. Zakaria does not approve of her political posturing:

she is terrified to act on her beliefs. In fact, she seems so conditioned by what she sees as political constraints that one can barely tell where her beliefs begin and where those constraints end.

I realize that political candidates frequently reverse their campaign positions when elected to public office. However, as Zakaria points out -- and I've previously noted -- American hard-line policy toward Cuba has been a complete failure for decades.

Note: I have a longstanding interest in US policy toward Cuba. In 1983, my college debate colleague, Mark Gidley, and I did well arguing for an end to the Cuban economic embargo, a ban on then-radio Marti, closing of the U.S. military base on Guantanamo Bay and a flat statement that US intervention into Cuba's internal affairs should be prohibited.